Spring declaration transaction issue

[samlv]

public void methodA()
{
for(int i=0; i<10000; i++)
{
methodB();
}

}

public void methodB()
{
// do something...
}

declaration transaction in application-service.xml for these two methods as follows.

<property name="transactionAttributes">
<props>
<prop key="methodA">PROPAGATION_NOT_SUPPORTED</prop>
<prop key="methodB">PROPAGATION_REQUIRES_NEW</prop>
</props>
</property>

We find the methodB() is running out of transaction control, that is, methodB will never rollback while some exceptions raised here.

if you know the reason, pls give me some advice. Thanks.

[Andreas Senft]

It's the usual delegating proxy effect. If you invoke a method on the same instance, that call does not get proxied.
If you would do this on an EJB it would not work either, as you would need to first get a handle on the instance and invoke the method on that handle.

There are different solutions:
- You could use AspectJ, where also invocations on "this" can be intercepted
- You could inject the proxy as a "This" property, invoking the method on it
- You could refactor the methods into different classes and use the current approach

Regards,
Andreas

[samlv]

Hi Andreas,

Thank you very much. But I am still puzzled about the option 2 of your three solutions. Could you give me some details explanation for the second option?

Thanks
Sam

[Andreas Senft]

Here is a simple example:

The context:

  <bean id="foo" class="org.springframework.aop.framework.ProxyFactoryBean">
    <property name="targetName" value="fooTarget"/>
    <property name="interceptorNames">
      <list>
        <value>interceptor</value>
      </list>
    </property>
  </bean>

  <bean id="interceptor" class="org.springframework.aop.interceptor.SimpleTraceInterceptor">
  </bean>

  <bean id="fooTarget" class="test.spring.Foo">
    <property name="this" ref="foo"/>
  </bean>

...and the code:

public class Foo {

  private Foo thisInstance = this;
  
  public Foo() {}

  public Foo getThis() {
    return this.thisInstance;
  }

  public void setThis(Foo pThisInstance) {
    this.thisInstance = pThisInstance;
  }

  public void op1() {
    System.out.println("op1");
  }
  
  public void op2() {
    System.out.println("op2 calling op1");
    getThis().op1();
  }
}

Note the usage of getThis().op1() instead of just writing this.op1(). By initializing "thisInstance" with "this", the code will continue to work without proxying.

Regards,
Andreas

[efinery]

I'm having the same problem i.e. same class method called from another but not starting new transaction. But I'm using the @Transactional annotations, and so can't inject thisInstance. Any idea how I get around this? (no pun intended).

Thanks,

Hugh

[Andreas Senft]

I guess the only options are to either redesign your code or to use AspectJ to overcome this.

Regards,
Andreas